


KHR Drabble Collection

by florienna



Category: Katekyou Hitman Reborn!
Genre: Author, Drabble Collection, Gen, I just wanted to put all these plot bunnies in one place, Ruler of Hell, Shinigami, asterisk au, may or may not expand on some of these, silver diamond au
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-08-15
Updated: 2018-02-10
Packaged: 2018-08-08 23:11:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 9,483
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7777360
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/florienna/pseuds/florienna
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A collection of drabbles for KHR.</p><p>1) Sawada Tsunayoshi, Nanimori High's unofficial flower deliverer and everyone's sweetheart, has more magic in his green thumb than he realises.</p><p>2) Tsuna and Hibari are angels who are the unlikeliest choice of partners, let alone childhood friends.</p><p>3) When eight year old Tsuna got hypothermia, it was only the first time in his eventful life that he would die.</p><p>4) The hiatus of T.S., mystery author of the famous Vongola novels, has more than just the human realm in an uproar.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Silver Diamond AU

It was his last bullet and his weapon was at its limit.

The parched winds lashed at Reborn and billowed his trench coat. He didn’t stir. He was a statue of practiced stillness, arms lifted, rifle unwavering. His eyes were piercing to beyond the desert, beyond the dips and falls of ashy sands, beyond to where the moon shone more benevolent. Its pearly light caressed the unblemished cheek of the prince exposed by the castle window. It was miles and miles away from where Reborn stood but he could see with cruel clarity. He always could see beyond what the mindless masses could.

This was treason and a death sentence twisted into one but it was alright, because Reborn was screwed anyway. The poison needed to be culled for the kingdom to heal, if such a greenless wasteland could even recover.

His fingers tightened on the trigger.

The bullet flew.

The prince turned his head. Their gazes connected. Reborn swore as the prince's servant stepped from behind, caging the prince, hands slithering into the motions of spellcasting like pulling strings. A rumble rose louder than a dozen stallions cracking their hooves. A whirlwind of dizziness sucked the gulp from Reborn’s throat and the night air began to distort in swirls, swirling, swirling. It chained his wrists and ankles and dragged Reborn in even as his fingertips began to fade.

The prince smiled.

 

* * *

 

 Tsuna buried his nose in the bouquet of flowers and smiled. Baby pink roses and freesias, boldened by a splash of snapdragons and humbled by a few feathery brushes of greenbells. The arrangement was a touch too lopsided to be called professional but Tsuna didn’t mind, because people liked to call his bouquets ‘charming’ and ‘sweet’ and ‘brightens my day, it really does’ while looking at his face with a dusty blush.

He slid open the staffroom door. His face was still nestled in the bouquets because it was easier than looking over at the girls who were helping with afterschool duties. Where his lips brushed petals, they unfurled to touch closer.

“Tsuna,” Mrs Nakamura greeted. She had set aside her Maths class marking as soon as Tsuna had entered. “Today’s flowers are as beautiful as usual.”

Tsuna shuffled and handed the bouquet over like a newborn child. They had, after all, blossomed under his love, his summer afternoon companions. He asked, “Are you sure you don’t mind?”

“Of course not,” came the unhesitant answer and Tsuna lifted his gaze to her motherly smile. She was a beauty both in her stunning French looks and her open heart that had won over half of the school delinquents. “I should be the one asking if _you_ mind. Isn’t it tough delivering all these flowers to teachers and students every day? You don’t even charge us as much as you should!”

Ears were swivelled, listening to the conversation despite themselves. That was Mr Tanaka by the photocopier, a demon in the classroom who doted on his granddaughter like a fool. There was Miss Sato sipping her tea, a petite woman who wore pastel cardigans and had spent one early morning teaching Tsuna the infinite ways to slam a man to the ground. Tsuna didn’t think he had ever seen rumoured ex-gangster Mr Takashi so terrified, or with eyes that diluted. Mr Takashi was hovering now near her desk with a wonky stack of papers and a slow-blooming love in his eyes.

Being the school’s unofficial flower deliverer had shown sides to people Tsuna would have never dreamed of before. Maybe it was the captivating life in the flowers that loosened their personalities before Tsuna.

“I don’t mind,” Tsuna smiled, unknowingly charming and sweet and brightening the day of everyone in the staffroom. “I have more flowers in my garden than I know what to do with.”

The girls huddled together and giggled, darting shy glances at Tsuna. His cheeks warmed and he ducked his head, mumbling about cooking dinner and needing to head back home before rushing out of the room.

A swell of chatter was muffled just as Tsuna slid the doors back closed. He could hear demands from the girls on his name, which class he was in, why he was giving a woman twice his age flowers. Tsuna hovered in amusement despite himself as Mrs Nakamura whipped them with her tongue for ‘inappropriate comments at school’ but when the conversation ebbed into whether he had a girlfriend, Tsuna walked away.

Wherever Tsuna walked, heads turned. Girls fiddled with their sleeves. Boys uncrossed their legs and grinned. As Tsuna passed the baseball pitch in front of the school, after school practice grinded to a halt by half of the players tossing Tsuna good natured yells like _bye Tsuna_ and _see you Tsuna!_ and _Sawada, wanna bring me some flowers too? Ow, don’t hit me Yato! My girlfriend won’t mind, you idiot!_

He wasn’t even carrying flowers at the moment. Tsuna didn’t know why they were paying him so much attention.

The truth was, Tsuna reflected as he began walking home in the golden sunshine streets, was that he was perpetually braced on the edge for his classmates to wake up one morning and think _hey, Tsuna’s pretty pathetic actually isn’t he?_ and for the cold shoulders and hot fists to come back.

The truth was that for too much of Tsuna’s childhood he had been bullied as useless Tsuna, as no-good Tsuna, as the crybaby kid with embarrassing grades and not a single coordinated bone in his body. He had been beaten and bruised until his foster grandfather had pulled him out of the last school term for a summer roadtrip, just the two of them and limitless roads and rocky cliffs and learning how to swing a punch like his life depended on it.

Giotto Sawada could have been a mafia boss. He had long passed away but with all the house bills mysteriously paid by shadowy contacts and Tsuna’s bank account mysteriously bursting with enough money for an obscure billionaire, Tsuna thought of his grandfather’s scarred knuckles and hidden guns and on sleepless nights, wondered.

The point was, Tsuna thought as he knelt at his doorstep and slipped off his school shoes in favour of garden sandals, the point was that after that summer he had returned to school in autumn and suddenly, he was left alone. Whispers snaked in his wake of his hardened muscles and straighter back and how sometimes, when the light hit his eyes a certain way, he looked like another being with molten lead for veins.

Then his grandfather passed away five years ago, then his mother two years ago and Tsuna started to deliver the flowers in his jungle of a garden so he wouldn’t have to think about the empty rooms in the house so much. Slowly, surely, the gap between him and his classmates gaped shut and now they flocked to him like hummingbirds to nectar.

Tsuna unhooked the garden hose and swivelled the tap until a miniature rainfall befell his garden plants under his palms. Ferns and fuchsias, lillies and lilacs, daisies and delilahs. Azures, magnetas, merigolds and greens and greens and greens. Vines wrapped around roots that burrowed as deep as the tree trunks spiralled up into the drifting white clouds.

Tsuna’s mother had a talent for growing plants. This garden was more like a jungle, overflowing from the brims of the brick walls and never-ending no matter how many flowers Tsuna trimmed with whispered apologies.

A well-told story flashed in Tsuna’s mind. Giotto Sawada discovering Tsuna’s mother for the first time unconscious in his garden, her then long hair entwined with the grass and daisies, a babe nestled at her side.

Something rustled in the distance and Tsuna spun around with baited breath. It sounded like something had fallen. He took a step, then another, until he was creeping along the cobbles stones leading along the side of his house to the back garden. When he turned the corner, Tsuna froze.

In the embrace of a bed of heathers, a man lay with closed eyes in Tsuna’s garden. Black hair curled at his cheeks and framed his eyelashes, a sharp contrast against his deathly white skin. He looked as painfully beautiful as dangerous like a venomous flower.

The hosepipe slid from Tsuna’s slack fingers and thumped to the grass.

The man’s eyes snapped open and he was moving like an unleashed storm, petals whirling as Tsuna was grabbed by the wrist and slammed to the ground with bruising force. He gasped and coughed and when he opened his eyes again, the butt of a long gnarled stick was digging ruthlessly into his forehead.

“What the hell?” Tsuna squeezed out with fire for lungs. “What is your problem?!”

A series of rapid clicks juttered one after the other and Tsuna saw the man pulling a trigger, realised the stick was some sort of gun, realised the bullets must be empty but this wild eyed stranger was _trying to kill him_.

“No— ” was all Tsuna could think to say, the _please_ and _why_ and _Oh God_ on the cusp of his tongue, and the back of his fingers brushed the man’s gun. Something prickled and crackled. The man jerked backwards, letting the gun go. The withered bark began to sprout spring green saplings that reached up, that thickened to branches, that shot down into the soil even as its trunk spiralled higher and higher.

Tsuna was still on the ground, his arms braced to raise him up and the man still straddling his legs. Both of them, though, had their heads turned to stare at the newly grown tree in Tsuna’s backyard. Plump fruits hung from its leaves in a shade of purple Tsuna had never seen before.

“What,” Tsuna swallowed in one big gulp. “What was that? The tree, did the tree just grow? What’s going on?!”

“It can’t be,” the man whispered, pinning Tsuna with his wide eyes. “You’re…the Sanome?"

“Who the hell is that?” Tsuna asked just a shade shy of hysterical. “My name’s Tsuna. Who the hell is this Sanome? Hey!” The man wasn’t listening, staring at Tsuna like the world had started revolving in a different direction. Tsuna felt the weight of his legs being pressed down and his heart in his ribcage. His grandfather’s ghost was in his ear murmuring about groin kicks and iron resolves. Tsuna glared and it was a chilling affair. “Can you get off me? I don’t want my flowers getting ruined.”

Luckily for the man’s privates, he slowly lifted himself up. Tsuna followed suit with all his muscles coiled and thrumming.

“Flowers…?” the man asked and then stared at the crumpled heathers on his shoulders with a baffling amount of bafflement.

Tsuna should put his grandfather’s tutelage to good practise. He should call the police. He should watch this intruder be cuffed and shoved in the back of a police car and then cook dinner, so he could go to bed on time and wake up early to deliver Kyoko’s free-of-charge daily roses on his way to class. He had homework to do and a perfectly normal high school life mapped out for him.

Tsuna thought of his grandfather adopting a strange unconscious woman in strange clothes with no questions or no conditions for his kindness.

He went inside to the kitchen. When he returned with a glass of water balancing in his hand, the man was cradling a daisy in his palm with raw reverence.

“Here,” Tsuna said and pressed the glass into the man’s hands before he changed his mind. “I don’t know what’s going on, but you should calm down first. Drink some water.”

“Water,” the man said and Tsuna’s heart broke at the way the man’s shoulders tightened. “You have water, and plants, and the sky is blue here. Is this an enchantment— a dream?”

“No,” Tsuna said, and then more firmly. “No. Here’s what’s going to happen. You’re going to drink your water, as much as you’d like, and then we’re going to go inside and have a long talk about everything. By the way, what’s your name?”

“Reborn,” and with that much hope dawning in eyes that weary, Tsuna knew he had made the right decision. “My name is Reborn.”


	2. Asterisk AU

“Sorry, do you mind if I— it’s just an insect in your hair, I’ll get it for you—” 

Tsuna struck his hand at the woman’s neck. He grabbed the black spirit lurking at her back and pulled it to his side. He smiled apologetically at the woman.

“It was just a small bee, it flew away. Sorry about that.”

“Oh no,” the woman shook her head. She hoisted her handbag over her shoulder and stood from the park bench. “Thanks for getting rid of it. I better head off then, thanks for the chat!” 

Tsuna waved until she had left before dropping his grin. Invisible to human eyes, manfis were evil spirits who possessed the remains of deceased souls and harmed living people. He had one in his grasp now. 

“Stop growling,” he murmured, slamming the manfis in a chokehold so they were chest to chest. “I’m going to release you now.” 

Tsuna exhaled and his breath of air shaped into one of his feathers between his fingers. He jabbed the sharp point into the spirit’s arm. A black shadow shot from the wound, swirling into a shrieking mass that slithered away quicker than a snake. Tsuna grabbed the manfis before it could escape and crushed it in his tight fist.

The spirit in his arms glowed a pearly white as it was purified, sketching the silvery outlines of a school shirt, a messy fringe, a bruised neck. Suicide perhaps, or murder by strangling. Tsuna’s heart clenched even as he cupped the spirit’s cheek.

“You’re still quite young,” he said gently. “I hope next time you’ll get to do the things you couldn’t do in this life. You can see it right? Just go towards that light.” 

Now that the spirit had been purified, it could move on from being tied to the human realm. It didn’t matter if Tsuna got bruised or battered or how dangerous it was to fight the manfis. It was all worth it for the smile on the purified spirits’ faces as they flared up to the sky like a rising shooting star.

Tsuna craned his neck and traced the journey with his eyes. Then he caught a middle aged couple darting glances at him as they walked past, whispering. He flushed. He was so caught up in saving the spirit, he had forgotten to freeze time. Now the passerbys in the park must think he’s a weirdo, or report him to the police _again_. Tsuna scrambled to his feet but his vision swam and tilted— 

“Watch out!”

 

* * *

 

The tailor’s hall doors swung open and all eyes spun to the customer. Knee high combat boots, tight trousers, tight T-shirt—all in the darkest shade of black that only highlighted the man’s gunmetal wings. They were poised still behind his back, the perfect picture of control. 

“Lord Hibari,” the head tailor greeted from a respectable distance. Work had come to a halt as everyone gazed at Hibari with shining eyes. The supervisors should have been telling them off. The supervisors had dropped their needles and were clutching fabrics to their chests. “Congratulations to your promotion as one of the Seven. The coat is ready and we made it as you requested but…is this thin material really alright?” 

Hibari folded the coat, rubbed the thin weaves between his fingers. He imagined, and then coolly said, “It’s fine.”

His lips curved up to himself as he turned on his heel and stalked out.

Five minutes later, the administration officer Basil manoeuvred his tower of paperwork to nudge open the tailor’s hall doors. “Hey, I have the records of silk production you guys requested, and did Lord Hibari really ask you guys to make a coat from his feathers….Hello?” He finally dumped the papers onto a free table and looked around. “Why are is everyone’s faces so red? What on earth happened in here?!”

 

* * *

 

“Hibari.”

Hibari’s only acknowledgement was a slight turn of head.

“Won’t you please stay a little while longer? I’d like to hear more about Tsuna.”

Behind him Lord Giotto smiled benevolently. With draping robes and a waterfall of hair as golden as his wings, the head of the Seven Angels was the highest ranked angel and Hibari’s direct superior. Hibari turned fully to cut Giotto with a scowl that put glaciers to shame.

“You’ve been throwing jobs my way and interfering from letting me return to Tsuna all day,” Hibari said in quiet menace, too low for the angels whispering reverently at their presence in the grassy fields to hear. 

“So you caught on,” Giotto laughed unapologetically and the whispers crescendoed. There was an increasingly high risk of someone fainting. “That child was the cutest of all my pupils. To think that he fought something so terrible that his coat was ripped beyond regeneration…Can you blame me for worrying?” 

“He’s too reckless.” Hibari dug his nails into his palms.

“That’s why you’re there to protect him. Didn’t you work hard just for that?”

Hibari glared.

“I don’t know why he’s so reluctant but please tell him to show up here once in a while,” Giotto carried on gracefully, unperturbed by Hibari’s stony silence. Hibari thought of the way Tsuna’s nose scrunched up whenever Giotto pounced on him with a hug or his silent plea for rescue when Giotto dragged him for afternoon tea. Hibari snorted to himself. He knew perfectly well why Tsuna didn’t want to come back to the angels’ world, but it suited Hibari to have Tsuna to himself.

“Lord Hibari,” Basil scolded as he strode up to them from the tailor’s hall. He tucked his silky hair behind one ear as he carried on, “The next time you need something from the clothing office, please tell an officer to go! The workers are useless now! Oh, and give these to Tsuna please.” 

Before Hibari could do more than bare his teeth at Basil, a hefty pouch was pushed into his hands. He felt the texture of soft spheres inside thick canvas and knew in a heartbeat what lay inside. Hibari’s face was a stone portrait as he callously yanked open the drawstring.

“Nono fruit,” Basil said, unnecessarily. “They’re the first of the season, harvested yesterday.”

Hibari stared at the pouch before nodding curtly and leaving without a word. Of all angels, Hibari was the last one who needed to be told what nono fruit were. 

In that moment he was a young angel of ten years again, with soggy paper for lungs and an invisible boulder crushing his chest. He was coughing, tossing, turning, and then Tsuna was tumbling into his sickbay window with bruised knees and a cloth of handpicked nono fruits in his scratched hands. 

They, too, were the first of the season. Tsuna insisted with a too bright laugh that he hadn’t gone to the red mountain where they ripened quicker. Hibari simply looked at the dirt beneath his nails and let the sugary nectars soothe his tongue so he could pretend there wasn’t a sweetness spreading in his heart. 

They were Tsuna’s favourite food and if they had become Hibari’s favourite too, well, no one needed to know.

 

* * *

 

“That was admirably done,” the person who had caught Tsuna mid-fall was saying. “But you should look after yourself better. Wait, is that Hibari’s coat you’re wearing?”

“He forced me to wear his while my coat is getting fixed—wait, Lord Ugetsu?” Tsuna exclaimed. Even as he was carefully guided into sitting back onto the park bench, Tsuna’s attention was caught by the fresh scar coiling up Ugestu’s otherwise unturbulent face. “What happened to your face? Why is one of the Seven down here in the human world?”

The light pooled in Ugestu’s oceanic eyes as he said, “I’ve already retired from the Seven.” 

A boy in mismatched socks ran past the bench, hollering and whooping as he kicked his football. Tsuna opened and closed his mouth a few times. “What?!”

“This injury,” Ugestu said unabashedly, as if he were talking about the jungle climbing frame or the ice cream van. “It was from a mantis, a powerful one. It won’t heal no matter what I do. I told the archangel that since I’ve already fulfilled my duty, I’d like to spend my days travelling alone. Do not worry Tsuna. I have made my peace.”

Tsuna couldn’t help but worry. Worry was all that made his heart beat on some days. Worry for the spirits, worry for the angels, worry that he would one day fail to protect those in need. A companionable silence blanketed them both broken only by the melody of birdsong and children chattering in the play area.

He would worry, but Tsuna would manage. “So…someone must have been promoted to the Seven to fill your place—” 

Arms wrapped Tsuna from behind and Hibari’s voice said sharply, “Tsuna, I'm back.” 

“Hibari—what are you—let go of me!” Tsuna yelped, squirming valiantly yet unable to break free of Hibari’s iron grip. It was easy to forget sometimes the monstrous strength Hibari’s slim body could unleash. To Tsuna’s annoyance, Hibari was silent.                                                                                    

“Tsuna,” Ugestu said slowly. He looked at Hibari with an uncharacteristically smooth expression before he shook his head and smiled at Tsuna. “My successor hasn’t been appointed yet. Well, your job is important but you should rest in the angel’s world every now and again. Giotto says he misses you dearly.”

“I bet he does,” Tsuna muttered and Ugestsu laughed as he walked away.

“Tsuna,” Hibari said, finally letting him go. A demand for Tsuna’s attention. “I bought you your coat.”

“Wait,” Tsuna interrupted. He fumbled with Hibari’s black leather coat, slipping it from his shoulder to drape it over Hibari’s instead with a grin. “It really does suit you better.” 

Anyone else would have been bitten with Hibari’s feathers for touching him, if not his words. Hibari simply rearranged his coat better with a practised apathy before manhandling Tsuna to help put on his new coat. With its zipper and short length, it was much easier for Tsuna to fight in than Hibari’s billowing coat, but…

“Isn’t this a bit too thin?” Tsuna asked hesitantly. A breeze made the bare oak trees sigh and Tsuna huddled in on himself with a shiver.

Hibari narrowed his eyes and Tsuna slowly edged away from him. He said dangerously calmly, “That’s because you don’t want to show your wings. If you’re cold, you can warm yourself with your wings. So why don’t you?”

Tsuna flinched and looked down at his boots. They were getting scruffy from too many roundhouse kicks. Maybe he should talk to Basil about regenerative combat shoes. 

“Tsuna."

“My wings are…I don’t want to show them. When I gained my adult wings, the thing is, no one else has wings that colour. It looks weird on wings,” Tsuna mumbled. 

Feather tickled his nose and Tsuna was startled into looking up. Hibari was hugging him again, this time from the front with his shimmering silvery-grey wings wrapped around them both. It was a cocoon of living warmth, a protective place where only the two of them existed.

“Don’t be so weak,” Hibari murmured into Tsuna’s hair. “If you won’t show your wings, you can use mine when you’re cold.”

 

* * *

 

“…Okay,” Tsuna said quietly and let himself hug Hibari back.

 

* * *

                                                                                                 

Hibari clutched one of Tsuna’s stray feathers in his pocket, and thought of heavy secrets and Tsuna’s wings the captivating colour of the glowing orange sun.


	3. The Death King

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Re-upload, used to be its own fic but putting it here for now.

It was an unusually warm spring morning when Tsuna died of hypothermia. He was curled up in a fetal position with his arms circling his knees and his head pillowed on a bag of ice cubes. He was inside the chest freezer, inside the kitchen, inside Nanimore Elementary School.

 

He had been trapped since yesterday afternoon, when the school halls were silent and small hands had toppled him inside with smothered giggles.

 

His soul tugged loose of the bonds of life and drifted upwards like a dream. It rose from Tsuna’s heart, massaged his throat and had just slipped past his tongue when a slender finger intruded his mouth and pushed it back down.

 

_It is not yet your time_ , a voice murmured in the empty shell of Tsuna’s mind. Then, his blue tinged lips parted in a painful, betrayed gasp.

 

Tsuna was eight years old and he had only now grasped how children, too, could be cruel beyond intention.

 

* * *

 

“But Okaa-san, I want to come too!” Tsuna whined.

 

“No Tsu-kun, ah, where did I put them?” Nana replied distractedly, fussing in her oversized handbag with one hand. She gave a breathy exclamation and pulled out a stream of catalogue vouchers like an accordion. “Here they are! I’ll be right back, just take a nap okay?”

 

“But it’s too hot…” Tsuna mumbled but his mother had already stepped outside their little red car. It was a special trip to the big chain supermarket, the one in the new commercial district half an hour’s drive from Nanimori. Nana had been chattering excitedly about the special canned food and ironing boards models and western cleaning products all morning, so when she smiled at Tsuna at the shops automatic doors Tsuna made himself wave back.

 

As soon as Nana was out of sight, he puffed his cheeks and slumped down against the scratchy car seat. He tugged at his orange hoodie’s neck several times before wriggling it off him altogether. The car doors were locked, the windows pulled up and the haze of heat was lulling him into a wave of sleep.

 

Tsuna yawned and let the sun at its zenith take his nine-year-old soul away.

 

Two hours later, that familiar hand was brushing Tsuna’s sweaty hair away from his forehead. He groaned, stirring but eyes too lethargic to open. The hand stilled and Tsuna tried to push himself against it like a newborn kitten, craving the icy cold it emitted.

 

“Who…?” Tsuna slurred, his tongue like lead, but he was hushed, not unkindly. He was being wrapped in the stranger’s arms and it was like entering an oasis of heavenly coolness. Tsuna sighed and smiled.

 

He fell asleep again, this time dreaming of silk kimono robes that danced with him in the clouds, twirling him in the wind until he laughed and laughed and laughed.

 

Nana would never fully forget dropping her laden shopping bags and screaming as her son lay collapsed with heat stroke, alone with the car doors still locked.

 

* * *

 

“I know you,” was the first thing Tsuna said upon being revived for the third time in three years.

 

With his head in the stranger’s lap, Tsuna felt his thighs stiffen. It was odd, since the stranger had been unnaturally motionless to begin with as if animation was a novel concept.

 

Tsuna wriggled his toes. He was sprawled over the railway line, legs bent as if he was running sideways. He should be dead. He did, in fact, die. Tsuna remembered.

 

“I remember,” Tsuna said, picking up his train of thoughts. “I was on my back back from the convenience store for Okaa-san and I bumped into those bullies and they chased me, but then I tripped on the railway lines and….and then….”

 

Tsuna frowned. The rest of his memory was in scattered fragments; the clanging of the warning bells, the paralysing terror, the blur of the green faced train as it rushed towards him like a monstrous beast— he sat up and choked on a cry, one that should have been too little, too late.

 

“The students from Nanimori Elementary School ran away. The street was empty this late at night and you, Tsunayoshi Sawada, passed away,” the stranger said evenly. His voice was quiet, like the rustling of dead leaves.

 

It was a voice Tsuna had head before. He shuffled backwards and looked at the stranger properly for the first time. He was a slim man in a richly embroidered silk kimono. Black hair in an impeccable bun, chrysanthemum kanzashi, porcelain white skin— just like a life-sized traditional Japanese doll, save for the milky white eyes that silently watched over Tsuna.

 

Distant memories lapped at the shore of Tsuna’s childhood, of searing cold, then dizzy heat and the hand that had saved him three times now. They were now folded one on top of each other; delicate hands, mysteriously powerful hands.

 

Tsuna didn’t know how long he sat staring but when the stranger rose fluidly to his feet, Tsuna jolted forward. His fingers brushed the fluttering kimono sleeve, clinging on.

 

“W-wait!” Tsuna begged. “Who are you? Why do you keep saving me? Am I dreaming right now?”

 

“Interaction with the living is not to be permitted,” the stranger recited, as if reading a rulebook aloud. His lips then tilted down and Tsuna stared wide eyed, still on his knees. The stranger hovered, as if perched on a string, before sighing minutely. “Tsunayoshi Sawada qualifies as an exception. You may follow me and I will explain the verdict.”

 

“Verdict— what? What’s going on?” Tsuna asked, confused.

 

“You may follow me and I will explain,” the stranger repeated again. He walked away and Tsuna had no choice but to follow. He was led through familiar streets in a situation unfamiliar beyond imagination. Tsuna lagged, stumbled, his limbs weak as if newly healed, but the stranger always slowed down just enough for him to catch up. Still, Tsuna was always one step behind and he was left transfixed by the embroidered patterns of clouds and dragons that embellished the kimono’s back.

 

Tsuna blinked, and a red-scaled dragon blinked back at him.

 

Tsuna blinked again, and an elderly lady entering her home walked straight through the stranger as if he were a ghost and shut the door behind her.

 

“Why do you scream?” the stranger turned around and asked, his thin eyebrows furrowing together.

 

“I— You just— that old lady!”

 

“Hanami Fujiwara, aged seventy-two, due death date tomorrow,” the stranger recited, again as if by pure instinct. “What about her?”

 

“She’s going to die?!” Tsuna’s voice rose shrilly. His weak knees finally gave in and he collapsed on the ground, feeling light headed and wishing he was back home where dinner was ready and his bed waiting. Ah, Okaa-san must be wondering where he was. He should really turn around and go back home, ignore everything that happened as a weird dream...

 

The stranger wordlessly pulled him to his feet and guided him down the next few streets with their hands still joined. His hand was cold, just like on that hot summer’s day, and dwarfed Tsuna’s own trembling one.

 

It was because his hand was cold, that Tsuna followed.

 

They reached the park and the stranger guided Tsuna to sit next to him on one of the empty benches. A stray teenager in a black hoodie swaggered past, hands shoved in his baggy pockets. His eyes slid over them both as if they weren’t there.

 

Tsuna huddled in on himself and was thankful for the gap that distanced him from the stranger sitting on the other end of the bench.

 

It was the stranger who broke the tense silence by opening his mouth and saying bluntly, “I am the Death King named Izanagi—”

 

“You’re _Death_?!” Tsuna exclaimed.

 

“No,” Izanagi corrected. “I am a Death King. My purpose is to guide souls to the Soul Realm after their body has deceased—”

 

“So you’re like a shinigami? Like a soul reaper?”

 

Izanagi frowned, as if unused to being interrupted. He still had the grace to say, “Yes, that is approximately correct.”

 

Tsuna’s mouth fell open, frightened beyond the faintest scream. His heart was pounding and shivers were wracking his ten-year-old shoulders. A shinigami, right here, right in front of him. Tsuna wouldn’t have believed it if he hadn’t remembered dying three times and being shepherded back to life each time. Maybe it really was an absurd dream but even as the moonlight pooled silver into Izanagi’s eyes and his white skin glowed softly in the moonlight, nothing had felt more real to Tsuna in his entire life.

 

“Oh,” Tsuna said softly and fainted.

 

* * *

 

Rousing into consciousness after fainting was, as Tsuna now learnt, a rather disorientating affair. All he could remember was the sway of his body tilting over, a jarringly delicate response to his entire worldview on the supernatural shifting on its axis. A _shinigami_.Tsuna’s goosebumps prickled the wood against his neck and he realised he had been laid to rest along the park bench.

 

Tsuna rubbed the grit out of his eyes and something slipped off his shoulders. He looked down to find Izanagi’s kimono pooled over his chest and legs. Its owner sat besides Tsuna’s head, forced to the corner of bench yet the distance between them now equalling none. Tsuna blushed and jerked upright.

 

“I-I’m sorry—” Tsuna stammered before a wave of dizziness washed over him and Izanagi’s hand lightly guided him back down.

 

“Rest,” Izanagi simply said and Tsuna obeyed. The night sky was a few shades lighter than he previously remembered, from midnight to persian blue, like paint diluted with clear water. The silence, too, was less oppressive than before. Tsuna peered at Izanagi from the corner of his eye in quick glances. He had somehow changed the kimono covering Tsuna for a plain black yukata that struck Tsuna as ill fitting for his feminine features. He looked mismatched, and somehow slightly more human.

 

Perhaps it was the last thought that gave the courage for Tsuna to venture once more, “I’m sorry for fainting. Aaah, how embarrassing...”

 

There was a long, dreadful pause where Tsuna contemplated throwing himself headfirst into the murky pond before Izanagi said stiffly, “It is I who should apologise. I collect human souls, not converse with them. You are the first human I have spoken to in such great lengths for many millennia. The arts of social interaction are…not a strength of mine.”

 

“How lonely,” Tsuna murmured before his brain to mouth filter caught up with him. He smacked his hands on his face and slid further down the bench. Between the gaps of his fingers, the slope of Izanagi’s shoulders was rather pointed. The pond really was looking tempting right now, putting drowning in front of a shinigami aside.

 

“You are the first person, human or dead, to say that,” Izanagi replied quietly. He gathered his composure with dignity, straightening his posture and meeting Tsuna’s eyes once more. It was unconsciously that Tsuna sat himself up and mirrored Izanagi’s movements. Something deep inside him was stirring, whispering to Tsuna about momentous winds of change.

 

“Tsunayoshi Sawada,” Izanagi began, back to his monotone recitation voice. “Aged eight, you died from hypothermia. Aged nine, you died from heatstroke. Aged ten at present, you died from impact with a train. Your soul has repeatedly attempted to leave your body before its due death date. Thus your unusual case had fallen into the hands of myself, Death King of Japan.”

 

“I don’t understand,” Tsuna said, the words fumbling awkwardly in his mouth. He had never felt so stupid or confused before, but Izanagi didn’t appear annoyed.

 

“To simplify, you are not fated yet to die yet Tsunayoshi,” Izanagi explained more slowly. “Even I do not know when a human will die but my abilities involve knowing innately when the time is not right. Your spirit is weak to the point where your soul is trying to leave this realm, instead of struggling to remain like most humans. I have guided your soul back into you each time you have died, thus reanimating your body to life.”

 

“So I really died. I’ve died three times,” Tsuna whispered, staring at his trembling hands. Izanagi leaned minutely closer, as if readying for another faint, but all Tsuna felt was an odd dislocation with reality, as if Izanagi would suddenly throw confetti and shout _just kidding_!He took a few deep breaths and the steady ticking of his rubber wristwatch only cemented that this was no practical joke or dream. “What’s going to happen now?”

 

“Nothing will happen,” Izanagi said and Tsuna’s head snapped up in surprise. “I have told you of your circumstances. You are now aware and will not allow your soul to slip loose once more. Regardless, if you die before your time again I shall bring your soul back.”

 

Maybe Tsuna was still out of it from his fainting spell. Maybe it was the impact of realising he had actually died three times without fully understanding it at the time. Maybe it was the downward curve of Izanagi’s lips when Tsuna had blurted aloud about him being lonely. Whatever the reason was, when Izanagi stood to leave, a spark of rare recklessness ignited in Tsuna’s heart.  He le apt to his feet and circled his fingers around Izanagi’s wrist.

 

“Wait,” he said and Izanagi stopped. He had the undivided attention of a Death King for the better or worse and it made his knees wobble, but he didn’t let go. “I-I want to know more. About myself, about you. Will you come see me again tomorrow?”

 

"I cannot..." Izanagi began but then fell quiet. He held himself still for several agonisingly long moments, with the shifting of the breeze and the humming of distant cars the only noise. Tsuna's eyes were watering but he refused to back down from Izanagi's gaze. This, an alien instinct in his heart whispered, was something important. This was something worth fighting for.  

 

Izanagi finally inclined his head slightly. 

 

"I will see you tomorrow, then," he said and his robes began to flutter. Tsuna blinked and he had vanished. He spun around but there was no glimpse of Izanagi in the stars overhead or behind any trees, as if he had melted away into the darkness. Tsuna's head began spinning too and he half sat, half fell back onto the park bench. It was strange that Izanagi's wrist had been ice cold, and yet Tsuna could feel a warmth blossoming in his chest. Did this feeling have a name?

 

(Ten years later, Tsuna would look back and think of how much his life had changed from meeting Izanagi. _Friendship_ , he would tease Izanagi, _that was the name of that feeling; that was the start of our friendship._ )

 


	4. Vongola, New York Times bestseller

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tsuna's personality here is different because he's older and more worn out.

The Underworld of Hell was an unhappy place.

 

Okay, this was admittedly not the best way to phrase it.

 

After all, the Underworld wasn’t exactly the ideal holiday location due to the screaming souls and flames higher than a politician’s shamelessness- not to mention the whole awkwardness of actually, you know, dying to travel there. It was a bit of a one-way ticket as far as the journey back was concerned really.

 

Yet, to put it mildly, the Underworld was much more unhappy at the moment than usual.

 

In the Underworld there was a hall. Was it in the centre of the Underworld? North? West? Actually forget it, giving directions was useless as the whole place had the tendency to shuffle itself around every now and again with all the vindictiveness of a sulking child. Hell had many halls, but this one was the largest, had the highest ceiling and held the top position in the strictly unofficial poll for the Top Ten Places That Hold The Most Evil Shadows.

 

The shadows circled around the foot of the high backed throne, close enough to reverently worship yet not daring to touch the figure lounging on the towering throne. The dim lighting obscured their features, only revealing the uneasy impression that they were so tall it was hard to tell where their head ended and the back of the mountainous throne began.

 

A demon approached the elaborate doorway, with ash grey skin and faint outlines of two small horns poking out of her forehead. She bowed low before making the long walk down the long hall. The shadows spent the next few minutes spinning round her ankles, snapping its teeth every now and again in their attempts to trip her up. It was an impressive feat for the demon to make it to the throne upright, especially with the aura that grew heavier and more sinister with every step closer.

 

Finally the demon was close enough for her voice to be heard and dropped down to one knee, ducking her head so deeply it was almost brushing against the stone floor.

 

The beat of silence while she took a breath felt like a stretch of eternity.

 

“Your Majesty,” the demon began, forcing her voice not to waver. “I have returned from the human realm. I have investigated and discovered that the human has not progressed in their task.”

 

Still the person, or demon, or whoever they were on the throne did not speak. The demon didn’t need to look up to feel that heavy aura loop around her neck and wrists. Instead of freezing up, she thunked her head on the floor hard enough to give any human a concussion and cried out, “I apologise for my poor news, Your Majesty! Please punish me to your heart’s content for my failure-!”

 

“Enough,” the figure finally spoke, their voice enough in itself to demand silence. It rolled and rumbled like a hundred earthquakes layered on top of each other in a magnitude of force. The black candles on the walls flared up and the stone tiles began to tremble. Falling over, the demon jolted up and gasped as she saw the figure raise what could have been arms or long claws into the air in a gesture she recognised.

 

“Your Majesty?!”

 

She was ignored as the figure stood and began to chant low incantations and the shadows in the room multiplied until everything was a stifling layer of black. In the darkness, there was a shuddering ripping sound. A tear slowly opened mid air, the edges lined with fire that burned with a vengeance. Inside the circle of flames, the demon could see the familiar skyscrapers and blue sky she had just visited.

 

“Your Majesty, are you…?” the demon trailed off before frantically clasping one hand over her mouth at her slip of forked tongue.

 

In the heated light of the flames, those crimson eyes that paralysed the demon shone like newly spilt blood before they turned to face the portal that had been opened.

 

“I have had enough. This human…needs to be taught a _lesson_.”

 

* * *

 

It was barely nine am on a Monday morning and Times Square was already packed to burst.

 

A flashy screen dominated over the busy shopping district, the sunlight so blindingly bright passers-by were forced to squint to make out the host show presenter. She was sitting with crossed legs on a lemon yellow sofa, a rapid accusation of words shooting out of her glossed lips like a prosecutor at court.

 

“And now for the latest update on the best selling novel series _Vongola_ that’s taken over the nation, with the latest and third book _The Future Arc_ released over three years ago—”

 

A fresh wave from the crowd drowned out the broadcast as a pedestrian crossing nearby flashed green. People were steaming into the square, incessantly chattering like a flock of rabid seagulls. Amongst the masses, a gang of spotty teenage boys were taking their sweet time getting to school. They shoved each other and laughed loudly as they stumbled out of a WHSmith.

 

As the boys tossed their coke bottles at each other, one of them stumbled and knocked down the advertising board at the doors, not noticing that it matched the front covers buried in their grass stained Nike backpacks.

 

“—remained a hidden gem until it was unearthed recently by the top dog The New York Times reviewer Marcus Mantiano himself, leading to a surge of fame—”

 

The pedestrian crossing light retreated back to red and the previously gentle breeze reared itself into a roaring gust of wind as if offended. Several bench sitters exclaimed loudly as they fumbled and clutched at their fluttering newspapers. A man in a silk blend suit gave his neighbour the customary amused smile, small and stiff, before ironing his paper flat with his hands. The front-page headline unwrinkled from ‘DEAD’ to ‘DEAD OR MISSING? MYSTERY AUTHOR SPECULATION’.

 

“—little is known about the mystery author T.S. other than their initials. Bloomsbury publishing company have refused to give comment on their author’s identity and their quite frankly worrying lack of activity—”

 

A waitress coughed discreetly and lowered a murky cup of black coffee onto an outdoor café table below the technicolor screen. A lady with her hair wrangled into a bun and eyes that looked like grey eye shadow had been applied upside down was engaged in battle in shoving a milk bottle in her baby’s mouth. She barely managed to spare a nod before she threw herself back into the warfare of cooing and internal cursing.

 

Finally rising victorious, she sagged against the white plastic chair and flipped open her copy of _Vongola_  once again.

 

“—paparazzi companies in a highly controversial move have begun to compete in offering cash rewards for anyone who can share information about this secretive T.S. —”

 

A shop worker in a red polo shirt and name tag was leaning against an alley wall on break, dragging a cigarette with one hand and holding _Vongola_ with the other.

 

“—debates have sparked in which activists have claimed any author has a level of obligation to the public in completing their released literature, especially when it concerns best selling books—”

 

The pedestrian crossing light seemed to be stuck on red as a faintly metallic odour began to stutter from the machine. Cars honked, cell phones were being pulled out and the people on the pavement were tapping their feet. As they twisted and grumbled in impatient agitation, their pristine gift-wrapped or dog-eared copies of _Vongola_ jostled in their bags.

 

“—but for now the huge masses of fans can only wait expectantly as the long hiatus continues. We have the renowned literature expert Marcus Mantiano in the lounge with us today. Mr Mantiano, do you support the belief that authors have a moral obligation to the public—”

 

In that moment the host’s face was obscured by a flurry of silvery grey wings like the spectral mask of a mysterious phantom. Down below the child that had chased the pigeons away looked up and their lower lip wobbled. A heartbeat later the screen was unobstructed, the child was wailing and the birds were soaring across the cityscape. Their shadow flew over billboards and buses and bicycle shelters all plastered with the same blown up poster.

 

A teenage boy on top of a mountain, his hands and forehead alight with flames; the iconic cover of the first _Vongola_ book.

 

One of the pigeons was beating its wings slower and slower, until it fell behind from the flock to settle on a windowsill. It closed its eyes, shoved its head into its plumage and fell asleep.

 

On the other side of the wall, Tsuna was shoving his head under a pillow. He tossed, turned, fluffed the pillow, pushed it aside. Eventually he simply let it fall to the floor and found the faint thump it made irritatingly unsatisfactory. A part of him wanted to leap out of bed, to throw the pillow against the wall with all his force so that it could make the deafening whack that he wanted it to make.

 

Tsuna did nothing except flop his head to the side and breathe in deeply, as if the air was water and he wanted to drown.

 

Even though Tsuna wanted to, he couldn’t stop counting the buzzes of his iPhone somewhere on the cluttered floor. This morning, it took three missed calls and ten unread texts for him to drag himself out of bed.

 

The walk out of his bedroom was hunched and lethargic, one bare foot at a time. His shuffles took Tsuna across the mountain piles of wrinkled clothes, chewed up pens and stray paperclips. In the living room, the furthest wall wasn’t actually a wall but rather a full sized window looking over the entire city from above. Its cloud high skyscrapers and car busy roads that illuminated the city at night gave the apartment complex a view that any high-class magazine would kill for their front cover.

 

The window was hidden by the tightly shut blinds, casting the interior into a foggy grey haze.

 

Amongst the gnawing storm of thoughts in his mind, when he entered the kitchen Tsuna was reminded why this was where he hated being the most. The haphazard piles of unwashed dishes and stains everywhere made him unable to meet his mother’s eye whenever the inescapable visits came around, too sudden and too question laden for his liking. Tsuna hated it and hated his mother for it and then hated himself all over again.

 

So Tsuna didn’t look at the sink or the counter as he dumped some over brewed tea into a mug and escaped back into the living room. He didn’t look at his still vibrating phone as he curled up into his white leather coach with the knowledge that his phone wouldn’t stop buzzing, just like yesterday, and the day before, and the day before that. If he looked at his emails, the inbox would be flooded as usual, each new email just as incessant as the last.

 

Tsuna didn’t like looking at a lot of things these days.

 

He took a drink; his tea had a salty aftertaste.

 

Not that it mattered because in the next moment the floor had begun to shake ominously. The mug of tea slipped from Tsuna’s grasp, ceramic shards and hot liquid flying everywhere, but he was too gripped by fear and confusion to care.

 

An earthquake?! This city had never had any earthquakes before—

 

A cascade of falling books and shelves cut off Tsuna’s thoughts; all he could do was try to keep his balance and not to get knocked out cold. He raised his arms to shield himself and could have sworn he could hear a faint chanting growing louder and closer until it rose in a crescendo of ear splitting force.

 

All of a sudden, a thick silence fell like a stage curtain.

 

Tsuna slowly lowered his arms. His apartment looked like a hurricane had popped in for a tea party before abashedly realising they had they had the wrong address and leaving.

 

Also, there was a stranger in his living room leaning back into his wrecked coach like they owned it.

 

It was a good thing he already was on his knees, because if Tsuna had been standing he would have fallen down anyway at first sight of the intruder. As the shadows retreated to the edges of the living room and the sunlight crept in hesitantly, the window blinds let in enough light with their half translucency to reveal what was in front of Tsuna. It was a man whose age was hard to discern, as if Tsuna would get a headache if he started thinking too hard about it. His hair made of fire and skin pitch black, as if it had been carved out of obsidian with a deadly knife.

 

The two horns curling out of his forehead were more of an afterthought than anything in assuring this man was anything but human.

 

Brushing ash from his shoulders with too sharp fingernails, the man gave Tsuna a too sharp glare. Tsuna should have been running or trembling or doing _anything_ other than automatically taking in every tiny detail about him.

 

In a blur of movement, the man crossed the entire room and pinned Tsuna by the throat against the wall with only his index finger and thumb.

 

“Tsunayoshi Sawada,” the man growled, his voice sending vibrations through Tsuna’s body and running plaster line cracks through the wall. “You shall now atone for your sins.”

 

“Wait- what- how do you know who I am?!” Tsuna barely managed to wheeze. His throat was released and he collapsed in a coughing fit. Something flickered in the man’s eyes at the sight of Tsuna doubled over and clutching his neck. The man’s shoulders uncoiled and he crossed his arms loosely.

 

“It is such a pain for me to come here myself,” the man sighed in a completely more casual voice, as if he had switched personalities. “But when the entire Underworld of Hell is losing productivity because they are going, and I quote, ‘bloody crazy waiting for that sick new mortal book’, well _then_ it has become my problem.”

 

“What?” Tsuna repeated, a bit dumbly.

 

“Your book, human,” the man prompted. “Why have you not completed your _Vongola_ book series?”

 

“Look, I don’t know anything about this book thing you keep talking about and who do you think you are anyway, barging in here and asking me all these questions like it’s an interrogation?”

 

The man leaned forward until Tsuna could see the faint outline of screaming souls in his flaming orange eyes. “I am called The Destroyer of Worlds, The Fallen One, His Majesty Supreme and King of the Underworld Hell. But you can call me Reborn.”

 

Then he yanked Tsuna by his collar and said lowly, “Now explain. Do not insult me by pretending to feign ignorance again, T.S.. Why have you not written the next book?”

 

“Don’t touch me!” Tsuna snapped and pushed himself backwards. His eyes were darting everywhere before finally settling on Reborn’s horns again. “I’ve gone insane. It’s finally happened, I’ve gone insane. Don’t you grin at me like that! First it’s just my editor, then it’s the entire world and now it’s the King of Hell. You want to know why there’s no new book? Because it was a joke! Write a book they said, everyone will love it they said, so I made the most disgustingly naive hero and cursed babies and crazy mafia families and threw it all together and now guess what? Everyone suddenly loves it! And now they’re all hounding on me, always asking when’s the next one coming out, when’s it coming-”

 

And Tsuna choked off at the last word and buried his face in his hands. For a long stretch of time all was quiet save for his erratic pants.

 

“We have sent multiple envoys to the human realm over these past few years,” Reborn eventually murmured. “They have reported your books to be inspirational to readers as a role model, both females and males of all ages.”

 

“It was just a joke,” came the muffled reply, tired and worn out.

 

Reborn simply hummed and carried on, “Although in my opinion, I always carried the impression that the main character was the author’s ideal persona. Someone earnest and brave and who was admired by everyone.”

 

“Demons are fans of popular literature. The King of Hell is a fan of my books. I’ve really gone insane,” Tsuna muttered.

 

“Well,” Reborn said, as if he wasn’t listening to Tsuna anymore. “Well, well, well, well, well.”

 

It definitely wasn’t Tsuna’s overactive imagination that Reborn’s hair was starting to burn brighter in excitement and…were those snakes he could see peeking in and out of those flaming locks?

 

“In times like this, I always like to stick to a good old saying from my Underworld; if you wish to find your way, blast yourself a new path—”

 

“I have _never_ heard of that before—”

 

“—preferably with as much death and destruction as possible—”

 

“—wait, let go of me—!”

 

“—and that is why you will be coming with me,” Reborn concluded rather cheerfully as he hoisted a struggling Tsuna over his shoulder as if he was as light as a pile of grass. Tsuna’s stomach clenched in hot fear and it took all his strength to twist his head around in Reborn’s iron vice. From the corner of her eye, Tsuna caught sight of his captor flicking his fingernails as if chasing a fly away.

 

There was the sound of something ripping open, followed by the heat of a thousand flames and the distant howls of hellhounds.

 

“If you cannot find your inspiration, I shall bring the inspiration to you,” Reborn declared and before Tsuna could get a word in sideways, he felt Reborn leap forward through a strange portal. The flames bled to black and the edges of the tear in the air smouldered themselves shut, until all that remained was a pile of ashes on the charred rug, a disaster scene apartment and empty silence save for the still buzzing phone on the coach armrest.


End file.
